President Kovind is taking India-Africa ties to a new high

In last three years of the Modi government, India has reinvented its foreign policy to transform India-Africa relations. The latest move in this regard was President Ramnath Kovind’s visit to Djibouti and Ethiopia earlier in October. President Kovind became the first Indian President to visit Djibouti, and it was also the first time in the last 45 years that an Indian President travelled to Ethiopia. While Kovind profoundly thanked Djibouti for its help in safely rescuing Indians from Yemen in 2015, he emphasised the fact that the African Continent has always assumed huge significance in the priority list of India’s foreign policy, while speaking at the Ababa University in Ethiopia.

Historically, India-Africa relationship has been warm and it assumed another dimension in the post-1990s era, with the formation of the India-Africa Summit in 2008, underscoring the desire of the two sides to deepen the engagement to fulfil their interests in an unpredictable regional and global order. The coming of the Modi government to power in 2014 further boosted the efforts to accelerate the relationship with African countries to a new level. This became evident from the participation of 41 African countries in the third India-Africa Forum Summit, held in Delhi in 2016.

In June this year, former President Pranab Mukherjee’s visit to Ghana, Ivory Coast and Namibia and former Vice President Hamid Ansari’s visit to Morocco and Tunisia further underscored the importance that India accords to Africa. Built on these developments, Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the four East African coast countries in July 2016 was viewed as a defining movement in India-Africa ties.

Undoubtedly, one of the stronger aspects of India-Africa relations are their expanding economies; with bilateral trade reaching $70 billion and the two sides targetting a trade of $500 billion trade by 2020. India has become the first largest investor in Africa, while having committed $7.4 billion in concessional credit and $1.2 billion in grants since 2008. While these investments have fuelled developmental initiatives in Africa, New Delhi sees this continent as a big market for Indian investment, goods, expertise, technology and services. Given low labour costs in Africa, Indian public and private firms have made huge investment in different spheres of African countries. This can be gauged from the fact that only in Ethiopia over 540 Indian companies have invested $4.8 billion.

At a time when China has made huge investments in Africa and is trying to engage this continent in its Belt Road Initiative, India feels that expanding economic ties with African countries would enable it to contain the growing clout of China. It was mainly in this context that during Modi’s visit to Kenya last year, the two countries signed a revised pact on avoidance of double taxation between India and Kenya, and Modi also announced the extension of concessional Line of Credit (LOC) of $44.95 million to the nation.

The recent move by India and Japan to develop the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor is further aimed to counter China’s Belt Road Initiative. To sustain and expand the growing agricultural trade with Africa is also at the centre of India’s engagement policy towards this continent, among other things.

To ensure peace and security in the Indian Ocean is a major security challenge for India and New Delhi believes that Africa can play a vital role in this regard. In particular, Djibouti, which is at the meeting point of the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea connecting Africa to Asia, and China’s deepening military control in this country and beyond, has become another major factor for India to speed up its engagement with African countries. It was in this context that last year India signed a MoU with Kenya on defence cooperation, which will entail staff exchanges, expertise sharing, and training.

Energy shortage is an important reason for India to aggressively pursue its foreign policy towards Africa. This continent has huge energy reserves. Kenya has one of the largest crude oil refineries. South Africa comprises 3 per cent of African coal reserves. Mozambique has one of the world’s richest off-shore natural gas reserves and massive deposits of coal. On the other hand, India is an energy deficient country, importing 70 per cent of its oil needs. It is also one of the largest consumers and importers of hydrocarbons.

Thus, India seeks African countries to play a crucial role in increasing its economic development. Given the numerical strength of the African continent, improved ties with its countries will also enhance India’s case for a permanent seat in the Security Council. To revive historical ties with the 2.7 billion Indian-African community is of course a priority for the Modi government.

However, while President Ramnath Kovind’s visit infused new energy into the India-Africa relationship, efforts need to be taken to expand defence and security between the two sides at a fast pace.

The author is a Foreign Policy Analyst